Local Marketing Strategies to Increase Website Traffic

Gone are the days when looking in the Yellow Pages or the daily newspaper were your source of information. In today’s digital age of unrestricted access to information, nearly 100% of local shoppers do research on-line, mobile or otherwise, before making a local purchase. Research mainly via the search engines (the undisputed starting point), with social media playing a lead role as well. But here’s the deal. When all is said and done, search engines drive more traffic to a website than all other mediums combined. To be blunt, if you haven’t done your due diligence implementing some simple, local marketing strategies, you’re seriously missing out. If you’re a business serving a local market, you certainly owe it to yourself then (and the success of your business), to understand what strategies will best increase your website traffic and leads.

In 2012, smartphone penetration reached over 50% of all U.S. mobile phones in use (ComScore). With nearly 86 million Americans using their mobile phones to interact with local business content, it makes great sense to optimize your website for local search queries-first, and then create profiles in as many local search directories as possible. Here’s a couple more statistics from ComScore worth noting…

56% of mobile phone owners use their browser for search, making it the #1 activity on mobile browsers.
The top reason for using mobile phones for local search is because information is needed on-the-go; 56% percent of mobile phone users selected their phone for search for that reason.

Understand Local Marketing

First-page position within the top search engines gets results and when it comes to local mobile search, this is where you must be to get results. Therefore, you’ll (obviously) have to move someone out of the position you’re seeking. Optimizing your website for local search, first and foremost, will not only make your website and its content more relevant to local queries, your content will also convey more competence than your competition’s. Begin implementing as many local SEO best practices as possible to improve your authority, and you’ll be on your way to a higher search engine ranking than your competition. It stands to reason that this will increase traffic to your website, and generate higher qualified leads at a lower cost.

Before you start, check to make sure your physical address and phone number is on every page of your website in text format. This also makes it easy for the search engines to develop relevance to your local area for each of the topics you discuss. The easiest place to do this is in the footer, although you may find that in very competitive situations, putting this information at the top of a sidebar might work better for you. When optimizing your website for mobile, consider including a ‘click-to-call’ link so mobile users can easily connect with you on-the-go. This simple step allows your site visitors the ability to instantly dial your number by pressing the number and hitting call on their mobile phone.

Create Your Business Profile

Verify and claim your listings at GetListed.org. Complete all information thoroughly, including clear and compelling descriptions with pictures, if possible. Create your profile in the directories below as well, keeping your information consistent, where ever you go.

Anyone who uses the web to find local services is also likely to look up reviews to determine which company to choose. Create an incentive for your happy customers to write a short review for you on Angie’s List, Google+ Local and Yelp.

Social Media Presence a Must

When it comes to local marketing, your social media profiles are an invaluable tool to reach out to your local audience. You’re only limited by your imagination in how you choose to engage but by all means, do it. And don’t forget to ask other’s to share your content.

Get External Links

Easy to forget and challenging to do, link building serves an incredibly important function. A website with no external links just won’t fare well. Why? Because, like reviews, external links provide validation to your website and its content. The hook here, of course, is you must have valuable content worth sharing. It’s other reputable websites saying, “I like what this guy has to say, so much so, that I’m willing to send my visitors over there.” Not only is it valuable as far as a traffic referral source, your website will rank better in the search engines. A good place to start might be your local chamber of commerce and local newspapers. Beyond that, go to other local businesses and find out if they’d be willing to trade links to each other’s sites, and, as always, continue to create remarkable content worth sharing.